Another Name for Azkaban
by Petite Samedi
Summary: James Potter and Lily Evans discover the true meaning of “engaged”. Remus Lupin is preoccupied with an “old school friend”. Sirius is lucky enough to be single, but doesn't see it as luck. Updated when I feel like it!
1. That's The Way it Happens

**Title:** Another Name for Azkaban

**Author: **Alias Madame Butterfly

**Rating:** R

**Full Summary:** James Potter and Lily Evans discover the true meaning of "engaged". Remus Lupin is preoccupied with an "old school friend" who wasn't exactly a friend until recently. Sirius Black is the only one lucky enough to be single, but doesn't see it as luck.

**Author's Notes: **This is in response to a challenge from Bob-chan (who wrote "The Not So Secret Life of Lily Evans"). She wanted me to write something light and easy to read, so this is essentially a Romantic-Comedy cookie for her. Creidwy Caliban made her first appearance in Bob-chan's fic, and we have joint custody of her. All characters, unless otherwise noted, belong to J.K. Rowling. I'm open to suggestions for this fic...makes it more fun. If you have questions or comments, or want to talk outside of reviews, email me: sangritalenfenthotmail.com. I always answer my email. This is boring even to me, so, without further ado…Chapitre Une!

-----

Another Name For Azkaban.

-Chapter One: That's The Way It Happens-

Lily Evans was pretty sure that what she just thought happened had happened. Looking down, she had fair evidence that, well, it really had.

Unless a big, sparkling show-offy diamond on her left hand ring finger meant something entirely different in the wizarding world…

…She was engaged.

Engaged. Engaged? How the Hell had she become engaged? One minute she had been thinking of redecorating the flat, and then the next, BAM! Not any more! This would mean wedding planning, bridesmaid dresses that her friends would never wear again, a dress that she would never wear again, relatives and…and…a husband.

Husband?! ENGAGED?!! Why, oh, why, did she let these things happen? It wasn't that it was bad exactly…she just hadn't wanted it to happen so soon in her life, or so soon in her relationship. They had been dating really steadily as adults for, what, six months? They still weren't used to each other's quirks yet. He had problems with her hanging up her bras and panties anywhere that she could, fine, that was his issue, not hers…but she didn't see why THAT was such a problem, when he favored cheap cotton boxers with Snitches and Quaffles on them. She shuddered. At least they weren't broomsticks.

Lily sighed. Being engaged wouldn't have been so weird if it had happened later. But now, she was eighteen and a half, engaged to James Potter and had no idea where to go from there.

Sneaking another look at the diamond, she considered her options:

She could play it off like she hadn't been paying attention (which was true) and thank him for the lovely birthday present. Yes! Wait a minute, no! Damn, that didn't work…her birthday was in July. It was currently October. Hmm…thwarted.

She could run like hell, cross the Channel into France and start a new life under a new name. No, too impractical.

She could grit her teeth and get out the white dress.

Well…it was a very pretty ring. And there were worse people she could marry than James Potter.

Next time, Lily, she told herself sternly, pay more attention to what's going on instead of thinking how a new paintjob would brighten up the flat! Who knows what else could sneak up on you this way, if marriage could? Marriage…ugh. It was better not to think of that right away.

Tearing her eyes from the ring, she looked up at her unexpected fiancé and managed a brave smile.

"Lily, I can't believe we're getting married," James said softly but with intensity, a wildly happy look lighting up his dark eyes.

"Neither can I, James," she sighed. "Neither can I."

-----

"So let me get this straight, Prongs," Sirius Black, James Potter's best friend snorted into the bewitched mirrors they used to talk to each other. "You're getting married. YOU? To LILY EVANS? What the hell is the world coming to?!"

"What do you mean by _that_?" James retorted, sounding sullen. It wasn't that hard to picture a woman liking him, was it? Maybe Sirius was just an extreme egotist.

"I mean," Sirius snickered, "That you must have had to drug her or force her or put the Imperius Curse on her! You expect me to believe that a class act like Lily Evans is going to marry you right off the bat? Come on, Prongs…even your best mates will only buy so much, you know."

James scowled at Sirius's laughing image in the mirror.

"Come on, Padfoot," he said slowly, realization dawning on him. "I know what this is about."

Snicker, snicker, chuckle, laughter, snicker…what? His best friend looked up at thim through the mirror, confusion written all over his handsome face.

"Yeah, I do," James continued. "It's about me having a girl and you being single. Again. Or would that be…still?" He finished brutally.

Sulking, Sirius didn't reply.

"Sirius…Padfoot…" the slightly older man coaxed.

Irritably, Sirius whipped his black hair back from his shoulders, the look in his eyes promising to murder James when they saw each other next.

"I can't help it," he muttered angrily. "You're getting married, and Lucius Malfoy's getting married, and even Moony's got a girl by now! Hell, even old Snivellus probably has a bit on  the side, but I don't really want to think about that," he finished, mock-shuddering.

"Wait a minute, you say Moony's got a girl?" James asked, interested. "I always thought he was too shy and too hampered by his condition to go for many girls."

"Yeah, well, I guess this one's really good at Potion-making, she can do that Wolfsbane thing," Sirius said sourly. "Must be from Slytherin then, that's their forte…though what Moony'd want with one of them, I don't know."

James mulled it over briefly. Remus Lupin, a girlfriend? Now THAT was weird.

"I didn't know any women who liked Remus," he said truthfully. Their friend had always been painfully shy around girls, knowing most wouldn't tolerate him if he told them he was a werewolf.

"I can think of one," Sirius continued. "Dark red hair, green eyes…NOT Lily," he added sharply, watching James's eyes mist over in the mirror at the mention of a green-eyed redhead. "She was a couple years ahead of us at school, and yeah, a Slytherin. I haven't actually met Remus's bird," he put in hastily, "so I don't know if it's her, but I think –"

"Wait! I know!" James cried triumphantly. "Wasn't her name Kerry Calvin or something like that?"

"Creidwy Caliban," Sirius said slowly. "Creidwy Caliban. And I'm praying I'm wrong."

On the other mirror, James gulped nervously. Sirius never prayed. NEVER. Unless he was very, very desperate.

-----

Remus Lupin was settled on a threadbare chair in his flat, watching his "lady friend" immersed in brewing that foul potion she had started forcing on him when the full moon approached every month. It had surprised even him that they had gotten together: he really, _really_ had not meant to ask out a woman from his rival house, but he hadn't been able to help himself. She was smart, pretty, and generally charming, if sarcastic, ambitious and sometimes downright vicious when in a bad mood. Maybe girl Slytherins were better than boy Slytherins? Anyway, she had been nice to him, sometimes OVERLY nice, in their school days, and as an added bonus, she knew how to make a Wolfsbane potion.

Creidwy was employed as the Potions Professor at Hogwarts in an attempt to earn some more money to supplement her real passion, classical singing, but was underpaid even there and talked often about leaving and giving the job to her friend (Remus grimaced) Severus Snape. On the whole, she had a smaller income that Remus himself, the reason she spent most of her time at _his_ flat.

Smiling slightly, Remus watched her work. She was singing to herself again, a song Remus recognized from one of the countless Muggle operas she adored and performed in.

Her long, dark red hair reached the start of her narrow hips and was held back in a thick ponytail to keep it from dragging in the potion. Her body type was more delicate than Remus usually preferred, not wanting to inflict his werewolf self on a frail woman: she appeared strikingly thin even in her favorite dark red robes, and her hands and lips were delicate and girlish.

Unfortunately, all that delicate appearance was deceiving, concealing an impish and saucy nature and the worst temper he had yet to experience, which, as Remus had pissed off various teachers _and_ Filch numerous times over the course of his years at Hogwarts, was really saying something.

"So, Mr. Lupin," Creidwy began mock-seriously, "given any thought to what today is?"  
  
Today? TODAY? Bad question! Bad! Oh, shit, today, today, today….anniversary, Christmas, St. Valentine's Day, Halloween…he hazarded a guess.

"Birthday?"

Damn! His voice had pitched itself about one octave higher than normal. She was going to murder him. He was dead wrong.

"Yes…." She said, slightly amused, "but, ah, whose birthday?"  
  
Shit!

"Er…yours?" Good. Voice back to normal.

"Yes!" She cried delightedly. "Twenty-one today. You remember what that means, right?"

Dear God, no. Shoot him now. Ready, aim, fire!

"Er…I said…I said…" What did he say? WHAT DID HE SAY?

"You said you would be happy to celebrate with some of my friends," she finished for him.

"Friends?" Remus managed weakly.

"Mmhmm," she affirmed, "You know…Severus, Lucius, Narcissa, Bellatrix…"

Remus Lupin eyed the cauldron, wishing he could drown himself in it.

What had he been thinking? A GIRLFRIEND? Stupid Remus! Cruel woman! Tomorrow, he resolved for the millionth time, he was dumping her and getting a goldfish.

-----

"Mum?" Lily said slowly into the telephone. "Mum? It's me, Lily…I'm…(gulp)…I'm, no, mum, I'm not pregnant! I'm engaged. To who? To James Potter, of course! Mum? Mum! Stop laughing! MUM!"

This was going to be the wedding planning session from Hell.


	2. Another Name for Azkaban

Another Name for Azkaban 

-Chapter Two: Another Name for Azkaban

(Ooohh…redundant chapter title and story title!)

-----

All in all, James Potter was feeling pretty good about himself after waking up in the morning and remembering that he was engaged. His girlfriend was going to marry him, Quidditch boxers and all.   
Grinning at his reflection in the mirror, he messed up his hair, shook it out and then messed it up again for the ultimate in "just-got-off-the-broom" hair.

No matter what Sirius said, things were going to go smoothly! Really! This time, they honestly were. Maybe it was just a fluke that things seemed to turn explosive whenever he and Lily seriously considered, well, just about anything.

That was it. A fluke.

Of course, it didn't entirely explain why their simple trip into Hogsmeade so she could buy some new socks had become way more difficult than it really should have, but then again, it could just be a particularly nasty fluke. Marriage could cancel that out, though. Love conquered all!

Humming one of the Beatles songs that Moony was fond of, James grabbed for his mirror and was about to try to get in touch with Sirius for Bragging About Engagement: The Sequel, when Lily's face appeared in it instead.  She was smiling widely, and her reddish-gold hair was slightly crooked and curly from sleep.

Hmm. Sirius could wait.

"James?" She asked. "James!"

"Yeah, I'm right here, Lily,"he replied, messing up his hair a little more, for good luck. Just in case…

"You won't believe the dream I just had!" She said, laughing.

"Try me," James answered smugly. "I really doubt it can beat that one I had with Peter in a nunnery and Sirius and Professor Dumbledore fishing for house-elves out the window."

No reply. She just gave him an odd stare.

"Never mind," he continued hastily. "So tell me."

"It actually had me really frightened!" Lily confessed, laughing some more and brushing a strand of red hair from her face.

He smiled indulgently.

"You won't believe this, James…I dreamed we got engaged!"

Grinning, he waited for the rest of it, finally deciding to prompt her.

"And then?"

"What do you mean and then?"

"And then what happened? In your dream…we got engaged, and then what happened?"

Over on her side of the mirror, Lily's eyes grew wide. She took a brief glance down at her left hand, and bit back a scream of shock. Huge, show-offy diamond alert! Oh no! This was real! And her dear old mum, of course, had burst out laughing. Lucky Sirius…_his_ mum had disowned him. But this ring…the shock hit her all over again. The big, sparkly diamond meant dress-shopping! And throw bouquets! And other bouquets! And flower girls! And most of all, two eighteen year olds…herself and JAMES POTTER, trying to organize an entire wedding in less than a year.

She was sure that she would die before James actually proved himself of organizing his sock drawer, let alone a huge ceremony that would bind them together for, well, eternity.

But back to her "dream". She had to improvise, and fast!

"I dreamed that we got engaged," she continued, and tried to affect a worried, downcast look. "That we got engaged, and you broke it off! And…and…I realized I would have to spend the rest of my life alone if I couldn't have you!"

Wow. That sounded convincing. It felt convincing. Lily gave herself a small hug of congratulations.

James smiled tenderly through the mirror at her, and she returned the look.

"You know that would never happen, Lily," he said reassuringly. "I love you!"

"I love you, too, James," she answered, before setting the mirror down.

Yes, she did love him and she believed it.   
  
She just wasn't fully sure she was ready for the entirety of it yet.

-----

Sirius Black was a man on a mission. Well, two missions to be exact.

The first and most important one: Get a girl that would be something more than a one-night stand. Sure, it meant having to remember names and important dates, and cuddling on the couch instead of playing Quidditch with James, but the long-term benefits outweighed the bad by at least a little bit.

The second mission: Find out who the hell sneaky Remus was dating.

"Oh, Moony," he crooned to himself as he picked up his mirror, "you may keep secrets from Prongs, but you can't keep anything from your dear Padfoot, can you?"

Flashing himself a debonair grin in the mirror, he sent another fervent prayer heavenward in hopes that Remus Lupin was not dating redheaded, hard-to-handle Creidwy Caliban. Because if he was, Sirius' girlfriend options were starting to look pretty dismal.

"Remus Lupin," he stated clearly into the mirror.

Within seconds, Remus's pale, grinning face appeared on the shiny surface of the mirror that had been Charmed to hell and back so that Sirius could have some means of communication with his friends outside of sticking his head in a fireplace.

"Sirius!" He crowed, clearly sounding delighted about something. "Thank goodness! I think I'm going to go insane. There's going to be a whole gaggle of former Slytherins over here tonight, and –"

"Gaggle?" Sirius interrupted, smirking. "Did you just say _gaggle_?"

The werewolf frowned at him, not amused. 'Yes. Yes I did."

His black-haired friend gave a few short barks of laughter. "Gaggle…ahahahaha, sorry, Remus!"

"You are forgiven," the brown-haired man declared composedly, then continued his earlier mad rush of words.

"There's a whole gaggle of former Slytherins over here tonight, and I don't think I can handle being locked up in a room with Lucius "Git-ius" Malfoy, Snivellus "Git-ius" Snape, your cousins Narcissa and Bellatrix and my mercurial girlfriend!"

"Former Slytherins at _your_ flat, mate?" Sirius asked, frowning. "Sounds a bit dodgy."

"Yeah, well…" Remus said, sounding apologetic, "It's all my bird's fault, you know."

Score! There would be an admission this time.

"This loony bird of yours, Moony, old mate," said Sirius slyly, "who is she?"

Remus smiled, halfway fondly and halfway as if he still couldn't get used to the idea himself.

"Creidwy Caliban," he admitted shyly.

"Creidwy Caliban!" His friend exploded. "Remus! How…how could you?"

"Padfoot, I KNOW she was in Slytherin, I KNOW she's three years older than me and taught our Potions class, but –"

"How could you take the sexy older woman with a license to buy liquor from me? From ME? AFTER ALL I'VE DONE FOR YOU!!!"

" I didn't take her from you!" A harassed Remus hastened to explain. "You never had her! How come Celina left you, anyway?"

Sirius muttered something about leaving him for some pansy French guy Cat Animagus who wore a beret and a neckerchief.  Remus nodded "understandingly". He had become fluent in Sirius-mumble-babble over the years.

"Yeah, well, you can have Creidwy for tonight," the werewolf muttered. "I swear, I care deeply for her, but she and her mates are going to drive me insane tonight. I can't sit at a nice Japanese dinner with Severus Snape sneering at me over the flower arrangement."

He ignored Sirius' joking comment about how on his and Creidwy's budget, a "nice Japanese dinner" was probably the code for instant Ramen.

"What made you decide to date her, anyway?" Sirius probed. If it was inconsequential enough, he could wrest Creidwy away, and then her lips and liquor license would be ALL HIS.

"I dunno," Remus said shyly, "I didn't even know her that well during school, but she was always, er, _really_ nice to me…and I ran into her recently and remembered how pretty she was! And I didn't want to be alone anymore."

"So how's the relationship now?" Oh, sneaky, sneaky Padfoot!

"I'm thinking of getting a goldfish."

"You mean…the two of you having a goldfish because you can't afford a baby?"

"I mean having a goldfish instead of a girlfriend," Remus sighed.

"More low-maintenance?"

"Exactly. You know, Sirius, being single is more of a blessing than you realize"

"How's that?" Sirius returned dangerously, mourning his flat's lack of feminine touches.

"Relationship is just a fluffier, cuddlier name for Azkaban."

-----

"Vernon," fifteen-year-old Petunia Evans whined to her boyfriend, "my weird sister is getting _married_ to her weird boyfriend. And they're going to have some weird wedding with all their weird friends, and mum said that my sister said _I have to be in the wedding_."

"Sucks to be you," Vernon said cheerily, "but nothing for it, is there?"

Petunia grinned evilly.

"Oh, I don't know…see, if I have to go, so do you."


	3. Slytherins and Squirrels

**To my reviewers…**all three of 'em!

**Bob-chan:** Thanks so much for letting me borrow off your fic, and for all the inspiration you've given me! I dunno if this is a masterpiece in the works…maybe a masterpiece for the seriously mental ;-) Oh, and thanks for the squirrels.

**LunasStar: **Thank you for your sweet reviews. I feel sorry for Remus, too (although I don't know where the goldfish mini-theme came from, exactly)…he suffers so much!

I'm going to take some time out and check out your stories: they all look very promising!

**Yosh**: Darling, I will see what I can do for you and your wanting a giant bear-like dog (and his human alter ego) for a pet. It's a romantic comedy, after all…

Severus sings? And yes, Peter in a nunnery. I'll have to refer back to that, it has promise.

This chapter is a little centered on Remus's plight, but the next one really takes off with James, Lily and the absence of a wedding planner.

**----- **

Another Name for Azkaban 

**-Chapter Three: It's "Only Dinner" if…-**

"Don't worry so much, Remus," Creidwy had soothed, laying a delicate hand over his with an uncommonly gentle smile. "It's only dinner."

Yeah. It's "only dinner" if you're not hyperventilating!

Unfortunately for Remus, it was more like disaster with complimentary refreshments. At least something good had happened. Well, it was good in Creidwy's point of view. Sick of too much work and not enough pay, she had foisted her job as Potions Mistress off on Severus Snape and was thrilled at the prospect of spending more time on her music. To Remus, this only meant that she had lopped a huge part out of their income.

He was already starting to picture the little goldfish he would buy himself. It would live in a glass bowl with blue pebbles at the bottom. He would feed it everyday, change its water on Thursdays and buy it little fake plants and treasure chests so it could be happy. It wouldn't be as skilled at brewing the Wolfsbane potion as Creidwy, but that was OK with him. He could get more potion from the black market.

But the goldfish! The cute, bobbly-eyed goldfish! It would never send them into debt because of a dinner party, something he was afraid had happened that very evening. It would never scream or hiss with rage, make him feel bad by crying, or coerce him to stop being angry with it with offers of make-up sex…offers he had never been able to refuse. Of course, now he could refuse them, if the goldfish even could make offers.

Which it couldn't.

Its name, he decided, would be Blubber the Second. And it would NOT meet its untimely death by leaping into an evil Muggle toaster, like Blubber the First.

"So, ah, Lupin," Lucius Malfoy began, obviously making an effort to play nice for his friend's sake, "what is all this junk –this _stuff_–," he corrected himself hastily, "all over your…charming…flat?"

Remus looked around at all the Muggle artifacts he had everywhere, including a toaster (the source of the Blubber the First problem), an ironing board that he had picked up solely because it had made him and Creidwy laugh, and a crashed Volkswagen Beetle that took up most of the space in the living room.

"Muggle artifacts," he admitted, disliking Malfoy more with every minute. "I don't like the toaster so much anymore, though."   
  
Deep breath, play nice, play nice.

It was disturbingly clear to him that Bellatrix and Narcissa found him cute. Snivellus and Lucius, on the other hand…well, he would be happy to drop in and say hello on the next full moon.

"And are you employed at all, Lupin?" Snape asked him silkily, his emphasis stressing the underlying meaning of the words. "What's your…profession…exactly?"

Remus shifted in his chair slightly. ". I used to work at Flourish and Blotts, but it didn't exactly pan out.  Now I'm…well, I'm helping Creidwy manage her singing, you know, looking for auditions and things like that. I'm looking for something additional, though, since you took over her job as Potions Mistress."

"I asked him to," Creidwy said quietly, shifting her weight forward so the neckline of her robes plunged a little more, hoping to mesmerize him into not saying anything stupid. "Three years teaching was enough for me."

"Anyway," Remus continued, "I want a job where I can take care of animals."

That way, he could have all the goldfishes he wanted, and a flat to himself.

-----

"Don't worry so much, James," Lily soothed, rolling her eyes at her fiancé and grabbing his hand. "It's only dinner!'

"Dinner with your weird sister," James retorted. "She's creepy! I think she hates me."  
  
 "Petunia hates everyone," Lily interrupted, "unless they're celebrities she can gossip about, and she probably actually hates _them_ because they're better looking than she is. And you've met my mum and dad; they're really nice! So STOP WORRYING."

James kept right on with the worrying, though. Actually, he worried like a pro.

He had no doubt that they would be thrilled that he was marrying their daughter and wouldn't hesitate to give their blessing, but he had heard horror stories about mothers and weddings, and wasn't sure he was ready to test the waters on whether or not they were true. In addition, he hated Lily's creepy sister with a passion, though he usually managed to quash his revulsion by remembering how much he adored Lily. It made a sort of balance in his suffering mind.

The sight of the Evans' house at the end of their travel from Hogsmeade was reassuring, at least.  It was a pretty, quiet looking house in a pretty, quiet country location, surrounded by old oak trees, gently sloping hills, little rivers, some more trees, and all the other kinds of junk usually reserved for Thomas Kincaide paintings. Really, though, it seemed nice and even comforting. With any luck, Petunia would be gone, dinner would be short, and he and Lily might have some time to go swimming in one of the creeks and even take some time out for a little fun in the sun…or in the shade, to protect his fiancée's delicate complexion.

In itself, the house was what most females he knew generally referred to as "cute": a moderately sized country cottage where everyone left their shoes outside on the porch and walked around a bright, clean house in their stocking feet. There were even a few household pets that could be seen from the front walk:  a dog and cat asleep on the porch, and a goldfish on the windowsill. A little statue of a squirrel sat motionless on the porch, and James poked curiously at it. He'd rarely met a statue that didn't move.

"Mum!" Lily cried delightedly, gently twisting the door open. "We're here!"

Quickening footsteps announced the arrival of her parents. James found himself face to face with a pretty blonde woman who resembled, if anything, a much friendlier, slightly older Narcissa Malfoy. Lily had gotten her looks, then, from her father. Mr. Evans was on the tallish side, topping out at around six feet even. He and Lily shared the same green eyes and Irish Setter colored hair, but she'd gotten her mother's eyebrows, nose and mouth.

A cursory glance behind them revealed a long-necked, surly-faced blonde in her early teens. That little troll, James realized, must be Petunia. She'd changed since he saw her last, and the awkward teenage years really didn't suit her. As a little kid, she'd been cute, if incredibly nasty. Now, she vaguely resembled something he would feed to a certain werewolf when the full moon was high.

"Come on in, James," Mrs. Evans said busily, ushering him into the hallway. "We're delighted to have you!"

Lily's father smiled genially and asked him a few questions about Quidditch, obviously not understanding most of what his future son-in-law said, but enthused anyway.

Only sullen Petunia (and Vernon, the equally awkward walrus-human half-breed standing beside her) seemed determined not to have a good time.

-----

"So tell us exactly how you two came to this decision," Mrs. Evans began as Lily and Petunia helped clear the dinner dishes and her husband served up dessert. "It seems like a rather sudden decision for two kids to make, although we couldn't be more pleased!" She smiled kindly at James and continued. "Lily told us it was rather a shock to her."

"It was?" James asked, confused. "I'd been leading up to it for who knows how long."

Lily blushed and smiled sheepishly. "Well, James…er, you know how women are! These things are always a shock to us!"  Especially when we've been tuning you out for who knows how long because you talked for an hour about Quidditch beforehand! She thought, frustrated. Men and sports. Men and SPORTS.

She didn't understand it.

"Is it gonna be some kind of _weird_ wedding?" Petunia asked suspiciously. "Like with the rest of your freak friends?"

Scowling, Lily turned to join her parents in berating her sister.

Now less absorbed in eating and making conversation, James was able to take his first real good look at the interior of Lily's parents' house. It wasn't bad: decorated with what he suspected women's magazines referred to as "tasteful, neutral, shabby-chic appeal," whatever the hell that meant. They had a television, something he had heard Lily talked about before, that sounded like it would be a lot of fun despite most likely also being more complicated than necessary. Muggles never did anything simply. In the room across from the dining room, he could see three large cherrywood bookcases packed with…a bunch of Muggle books.  On top of each of them, he noticed a little squirrel statue, exact copies of the little statue that sat on the Evans's front porch. There was another statuette sitting by the table lamp. Next to him, clustered around the floor lamp, were about five stone squirrels.

Rubbing his eyes, James checked again. Yep, still there. There were some in the kitchen, too…over the stove, on the windowsills and the baker's rack…the salt and pepper shakers. Everything. The bloody curtains were patterned with bloody squirrels!

Suddenly, he was seeing squirrels –stone or otherwise– everywhere he looked. It was exactly like an invasion. A fucking HAUNTING. Of squirrels.

Lily and her mother were talking about "precious" looks for the bridesmaids and flower girl. James covered his eyes and put his head in his hands. Why did he have a feeling that squirrels would somehow make an appearance at his wedding…and they wouldn't be part of any "hillybilly exotic" entrée?

-----

The Slytherins were gone, but not until it was too late. They had left at around three in the morning. By that time, Remus's little dream goldfish was living in palatial splendor and he had mentally evicted the redheaded Creidwy Caliban, her cauldron and her vocal chords and sent her off to find a new manager.

"Right," he said smartly to himself. "She's just a woman. I am impervious to her tears, her rages, her perfume and her offers of sex rampant enough to please Sirius black for a month running. I, Remus Julien Lupin, AM GETTING A GOLDFISH. She always favored Snivellus in Potions class, anyway…"

That was only somewhat a lie. In her days as Professor Creidwy Caliban (Miss), she had favored Remus, but had despaired over the fact that he was complete trash at brewing more than a cup of tea.

"Come tomorrow," he told himself firmly, " that guppy is mine!"

Resolutely, he stepped into his –now _their_– bedroom, intending to drop a huge bomb and then run like hell.

"Creidwy Musetta," he started, using her first and middle names, then stopped just as abruptly as he had begun.

She was sitting cross-legged in his chair, her hair in two braids for sleep and a decent amount of slender leg showing beneath the hemline of her casual nightgown, looking about five or six years younger than she really was. It was probably the braids.

The expression on her face was slightly forlorn, which, if it was another woman, would probably be explainable within the space of a few words. Since this was Creidwy, however, he was fairly sure that something had died in there house, something illegal that _shouldn't_ have been there and he hadn't _known_ had been there, and now she was having real problems getting rid of it. Whatever it was.

It probably wouldn't be easy or fun. And since she brewed quite exotic potions, the thing was probably still poisonous after it had been dead and festering in his walls for a few hours.

"Creidwy Musetta," he started again, "er…whatever dead thing's in our walls, I want it gone."

"Dead thing?" She looked confused. "What dead thing? Oh! No, Remus, this isn't a repeat of two months ago."

Well, thank Merlin for small miracles. Two months ago, he had bought the tragically-fated Blubber the First, but the poor fish hadn't lived long enough for Remus to throw Creidwy out and bring the goldfish in. The toaster had seen to that, and Creidwy had atoned for her sins.

Well, that wasn't happening this time.

"Look, Creidwy, I wanna get a goldfish," he said by way of explanation, mentally smacking himself. Oh, good one Remus. Smooooooooooth. That sure as hell explained a lot.

"A goldfish?" She replied, cutting her eyes at him slightly. "A goldfish? Remus, it's three in the morning. You canNOT go get a goldfish now. Tomorrow."

He opened his mouth to speak again, but she cut him off. Foiled!

"I'm really sorry about tonight," she said simply. "I know you hate my friends, and with good reason. Thank you for not ruining everything." Rising from her chair, she touched him lightly on the back of the hand. "You should sleep sometime within the next forty-eight hours. Full moon's next week."   
  
Damn, damn, damn! Blubber the Second's little aquatic palace was diminishing to a glass bowl, and even that was fast disappearing. He'd forgotten how kind she could be to people she favored…even fun to be with, even if her company sometimes brought the level of risk in life up to Seriously Not Worth It. He could go without a goldfish for at least another few days…or at least one more night. He grinned evilly.

"So I should sleep sometime within the next forty-eight hours?"  
  
She nodded, not making much of it. "Yeah."

"Not necessarily tonight, though," he added. "You said forty-eight hours."

She smiled and loosened the top of her nightgown. "Still like me?"

Forgetting the goldfish (well, not entirely, but at least putting it in the very back of his brain), he pressed his lips to hers.

What could he do? For now he loved her.

He would love her even more once that stupid nightgown came off.

-----

In her wedding dress, Lily looked beautiful. James could only gape at her like, well, a goldfish, waiting for Albus Dumbledore to tell him he could now kiss the bride.

As he waited for it, he noticed a fat gray squirrel go running across the lawn in front of them.

Strange, but to be expected with an outdoor wedding. Trying to focus once more on Dumbledore and on Lily, James turned away from the squirrel as it reached a knot of more fat, gray bushytailed rodents.

It was unfortunate about the bridesmaids, James thought. They were all wearing little brooches shaped like squirrels. Maybe it was to match the decorations?

"You may kiss the bride," Dumbledore told him with twinkling eyes, and James forgot about the infestation. He turned to Lily, lifted the veil from her face and beheld not his bride, but a gigantic red-haired stone squirrel head.

It was their god. Their cutesy, bushytailed god.

James awoke nearly maddened by his nightly visions of bright-eyed, nut-chomping monsters.

Just a nightmare. A pre-wedding nightmare caused undoubtedly by pre-wedding jitters.

Well, that was one down, about ninety-two thousand to go.


	4. Anything but the Chudley Cannons

Hey! The reviews are starting to come in, sort of. That's good news…I'm ECSTATICALLY happy to know that people are reading this and enjoying it. This fic=my first romantic comedy. Too bad it's a fanfiction, otherwise I might attempt publishing it.

**Yoshiko:** Thanks for the emails grins. Haha, I hear Potions Professor, I think Severus.

**Bob-chan: **You ARE a weirdo…but not just because you read stories online. The wedding planner will be an absolute necessity very quickly!

**LunasStar:** Have I thought of being a comedian? Actually, yes! I could go on The Last Comic Standing and talk about goldfish smiles But I actually find opera easier, because my brain just works that way. So glad to hear you're still enjoying the story!

Do y'all think Creidwy is really that much of a madwoman? And one more thing…does Severus Snape remind anyone else of the Phantom of the Opera? He's surly, he skulks around in dark dungeons…

-----

"So, James," Sirius began, facing his friend. He, Remus, Peter and the aforementioned Potter had secluded themselves in a slightly stuffy, brightly lit room at the Leaky Cauldron Inn at the request of James himself, who had driven his three friends to the brink of madness and back by not telling them anything other than that they had better be there. "Are you planning on giving us a reason to be here, or do you just think we're all mental enough to go along with what you've got planned? Incidentally, if this is Operation Bird For Padfoot, I say three thumbs up, full steam ahead, let the panty raids commence!"

Peter, of course, found this incredibly amusing and nearly killed himself laughing over it. That was typical Wormtail…suck up to the big boys and hope it saves you a future beating by them.

James simply mussed his hair again, giving it the look of a strangely darkened bird's nest in a windstorm, and said "Nah, that's not quite it. But panty raids are still an option with what I've got planned." He grinned devilishly.

Ordinarily, Remus would have been the one to leap up, smack James upside the head and demand information and demand it NOW. He, however, had buried his head completely in an insanely thick novel by some Muggle professor and was dead to the world that existed outside its pages. The other three guessed he was trying to rid himself of thoughts of green eyes, sex and goldfish…and hoped he had not progressed to thoughts of sex _with_ green-eyed goldfish.  Since he was, for once, uninterested, Sirius made it his personal duty to see to it that James was smacked and overwhelmed all in one go.

"Fine, fine, fine!" James shouted from his new hiding place under the table, wedged in between Peter's left leg and Sirius's right. "I'll tell you everything. You lot are completely mad…well, maybe not Moony. Actually," he continued, "I think our Moony _is_ mad, it's just a different brand."

"Will you GET ON WITH IT?!" Sirius exploded, looking very much like he wanted to throw James bodily from the room.

"Yay! Carnage!" Remus exclaimed with delight, hugging the book to him tightly.

James and Sirius exchanged a look.

"I thought you said he'd got a goldfish?"  
  
"He said he was going to!" Sirius protested. "They must still be together."

"She's a bad influence," James said sagely. "Yay, carnage? Anyway, gentlemen, shall we get on with it?"

Peter nodded enthusiastically, Sirius settled himself back in his chair with a satisfied smirk, and, with considerable effort, Remus extracted his head from the book.

"The Lord of the Rings," James read. "Interesting. Somehow I doubt I'll be reading that anytime soon. But my dear Marauders, we are here today because we have a very important mission."

He broke off there, obviously expecting a clamor of excited, interested voices.

Of course, none came…

"Our mission, should you choose to accept it –and of course you have to, otherwise I will cheerfully beat all three of you into a delightfully tender pulp and spoon-feed you to Snivellus– is a simple one. We are going to plan a wedding."

"Plan a wedding?!" Peter exclaimed in fright. "Plan a wedding?! We don't know enough to plan an entire wedding! Who's getting married?"

"I am, Wormtail," James explained in the patient tone reserved for mentally handicapped three year olds. "This is my wedding we're planning."  
  
"Can't be done," Sirius replied cheerfully. "Now finding a girl for a handsome dog like me…that might be a little closer to reality…"

"You're wealthy," James snapped. "Find a random one and pay her."

"He doesn't realize how lucky he is," Remus said morosely. James nodded in agreement.

"I"ll give you that, Moony. He doesn't realize that girls leave things like _bras_ just lying around where anyone can see them!"

"Or that they're really scary. Scary enough that when my transformation coincides with her…er…well, it's not a transformation, but I'm glad it's only once a month, it's almost enough to keep me human."

"And they have some weird obsession with their mums," James mused. "Always wanting to have a chat with mum, even if they hated her during their teen years. As soon as they get in a relationship, it's mum this, mum that, meet the family, blah blah blah…but do they say meet the SQUIRRELS? No. NEVER."

"And they get in the way of having a nice, quiet existence with a goldfish!" Remus declared somewhat passionately, once more about a sixtieth of the way resolved to do something he would probably never manage within three lifetimes.

His three friends all broke eye contact with him immediately, and began edging ever so slightly towards the door. Goldfish…

"And you want to get married?" Peter asked incredulously.

"Oh, yeah," James affirmed. "I love her, I might as well marry her. And even if women are all mad, they're okay to have around…right, Sirius?"

Sirius snarled and launched himself bodily at James, who just ducked behind a chair, laughing as his best friend plotted the sneakiest of sneaky revenges.

"First off," James continued. "What are we going to do about bridesmaids?"

"Prongs?" Peter began. "Prongs? Shouldn't that be left up to Lily?"

James looked confused.

"You know, Lily's the bride, she should pick her bridesmaids," Remus explained. "That's how things are done."  
  
 "Not if she's putting her troll sister in the wedding," said Sirius darkly.

"It's not how this is done!" James protested, scandalized. "I don't want Lily to have to do any work! I mean, it's HER day, yadda yadda yadda, so she should just sit back and enjoy it and not worry about planning. So who are our bridesmaids? I know how we can get for the Maid of Honor!" he said brightly. "Cel–"

"NOT Celina Adrienne!" Sirius protested loudly. "I don't care if she was Lily's best friend at school, she was mental!"

"Oh, that's right," Peter whispered to Remus in a 'sympathetic' tone. "She left him…for a Cat Animagus!"

"Well, you know, Padfoot, dogs are _man_'s best friend after all. I'm sure Snivellus or someone would love to have you," James said slyly.

Sirius had to be forcibly restrained by Remus knocking the table over on him.

"I thought you were talking about bridesmaids, not Sirius's sexual preferences." Remus commented drily.

"My sexual preferences are the bridesmaids!!!!"

"I didn't hear that," James said loudly. "Celina is the maid of honor…other bridesmaids…let's see. Olivia Jordan, PetuniabutonlybecauseLilysaidshewantshersisterintheweddingandyoudonthavetoshagALLthebridesmaids,Sirius. Remus, could we get Creidwy to do it?"

Remus shook his head. "Probably not. She and Lily are just acquaintances. If you want a wedding singer, though, she's your woman. Just specify that the music can't involve mad scenes, death scenes or mourning scenes from any opera or musical, and you're okay. She does weddings, and we REALLY need the money," he said pointedly, shooting a look at James. "And she knows another soprano and a tenor who'll sing with her in duets and trios."

"Okay," James said cheerfully, "one…er, three…wedding singers. I'll find another bridesmaid SOMEhow. Sirius is the best man. Peter, Remus and Matthew Jordan can be groomsmen…"

"I am NOT best man if Adrienne is the Maid of Honor!" Sirius yelled to no avail. "Why don't we dress Remus up as Maid of Honor? At least HE never ran out on me…on us!"

There was a pause for a few beats as James and Peter exchanged a glance and said simultaneously: "I don't want to know…I really don't!"

"Gee, thanks, Padfoot," Remus muttered. "I'm touched. Really."   
Maybe he would get a betta, one of those nice little Siamese fighting fish, and push Sirius into a river somewhere.

"So what's the color scheme?" Sirius asked. "Women LOVE color schemes."

"It's orange and black, of course!" James told him, scandalized. "What else?"

"Chudley Cannons colors?" Remus deadpanned. "At your WEDDING? Lily will kill you…and so will the bridesmaids if they find out they have to wear orange!"

"So let them wear black."

"Not at a wedding! James!"

"I thought girls liked colors like pink and purple?" Peter asked.

"Ohohoho, so now Wormtail knows what women want!" Remus laughed. "When did this happen?"

"What about a…what's the word?" Sirius put in.

"A compromise!" the werewolf yelled, snapping his fingers. "James, women love compromise. So go with pink and purple…AND black and orange."

James nodded. It seemed to work. With the touchy girlfriend that Remus had landed himself with, he was an expert on compromise. "Now we need music."

Peter shook his head. "First food, then music."

"Barbecue!" Sirius called out. "Food is settled. Music, now."

James grinned to himself. And people had said planning weddings was hard? This was going to be a piece of cake. Cake? CAKE?! They needed a wedding cake! But he could just call a baker for that, so it was all right.

"Musically," he said slowly, "Remus, you can tell Creidwy and her friends to put away the opera. Maybe two songs at the most, and nothing that can shatter windowpanes. I want them to sing…I want them to sing…"

The entire room (well, the other three men in it, anyway) held its (their?) breath.

"LED ZEPPELIN!"

Remus shook his head slowly, light brown hair flopping into his eyes. Lily was going to kill him, that was for sure…

"Boys," he said dramatically, "I'm going to find us a professional."


	5. The Professional

Author's Note: I hope you guys have missed this fic as much as I have (I've been working, not writing).And Bob-chan…I'm sorry ,but I don't know what happened to your character bio. I wanted to get this chapter written, so I took a little license with Aurora. I wrote down what I could remember, and made up the rest based on you.

---------

"Gentlemen," Remus began, gazing seriously at the three young men he spent most of his time with (in a platonic fashion…of course) "this cannot go on. After our last meeting about the wedding, I decided that we needed a bit of a…er, well, a bit of a feminine touch, if you will, and, well, to make a long story short, I explained to Creidwy what we're doing here."

"You did what?" James asked disbelievingly. "Remus, that girl wouldn't know how to plan a wedding if wedding plans came up to her one night and bit her right on the –"

"Wait!" Remus interrupted, sounding harassed. "You have no idea what she said to me. She said no woman in her right mind would want Led Zeppelin and barbecue at her wedding, and that 'pink, purple, orange and black is under NO circumstances an appropriate color scheme for a wedding,'" he stressed, putting on a drawling soprano voice for effect.

"Whoever said Lily was in her right mind?" Peter pointed out.

"AND," the current speaker continued, "she said that if I allowed you all to totally ruin the wedding, then I wasn't as understanding of women as she had thought, and that she would throw me out and leave me!"

Silence. Count three, four, five.

"Er…Remus, mate?" Sirius ventured. "A few things. One: She cannot throw you out of a flat that YOU pay the rent on in YOUR name. Two: If she did leave you, you could get that fucking goldfish and be done with it. Three: said circumstances would leave you a lot happier, so why complain?"

"You don't understand!" the werewolf howled. "She is the only…the ONLY woman I have met that doesn't mind that I'm a werewolf who can't get a job! If she leaves, I MAY NEVER HAVE SEX AGAIN, EVER!"

The other three gazed at him silently for a moment, contemplating him.

"It's as if some internal reservoir has finally burst," James declared in a rare moment of lucidity.

"I've never even had sex," Peter countered. "You might not miss it after a while."

Unintelligable spluttering noise from Remus.

"Look," Sirius illustrated sensibly, "that's what hookers are for, Remus."

"Says the bloke that can't get a bird!" James laughed aloud. "You only complain about YOUR singledom twenty-four/seven."

"I'm Sirius Black!" The dark-haired man countered haughtily. "I don't have to pay women to…Argh!"

His last words were cut off as Remus hit him with a flying tackle.

"Oh, would you GET ON WITH IT ALREADY!" A female voice issued from behind the door.

All four men looked at each other slowly.

"What," James demanded sternly, "was that?"

Smoothing his hair and straightening his worn clothes as much as possible, Remus drew himself to his feet.

"Gentlemen," he began (again), "may I introduce…the professional!"

-----

"The Professional", James decided, definitely looked like the sort of woman who went into weddings as a career choice because she was totally, completely mad for that sort of thing. One look at her robes proved it: they were made of floaty, frilly, sparkly blue stuff that Lily would just adore if she were to see it. Lily, however, was not there to see it….just the Marauders, who were all goggling slightly, trying to work out if they were impressed, charmed or scared. Peter's face had gone a tad blank, and his tongue was lolling slightly, but that was sort of normal for him anyway. He wasn't exactly used to being in this close proximity to pretty women, and The Professional was quite pretty indeed. She was tall and slim, with a fair complexion, hazel eyes and long, silky light brown hair. She looked, James thought, a few years older than they were. Maybe about Creidwy's age, though hopefully a lot less mad.

"Hello," the young woman said energetically. "I'm Aurora Venus, and I'll be your wedding planner for this event. Good thing, too, because from what I've heard, you need one!" She smiled cheerfully at the four young men, awaiting their response.

"What, exactly, did you say to her?" James hissed to Remus through his teeth, sounding annoyed. He could tell that she thought they were all hopelessly incompetent as wedding planners. Something about the way she seemed to be fighting back a serious case of giggles…

"Nothing! Nothing!" Remus said hastily, looking like he wished he could melt away into the carpet until the whole thing was over. "I just told her that we're a group of recent graduates who are hopelessly incompetent at planning this type of thing, and we're in desperate need of help before we all get killed or go insane."

James just stared. This was one of those moments when his dear Moony seemed to be _this close_ to going completely around the bend...

"So!" Aurora continued smartly, "what exactly did you have planned so far? I don't really like to work with nothing, you know."

Sirius, who had been eyeing up the young and pretty wedding planner, decided that it was his moment to speak and impress her with his fantastic skills of compromise.

"Well," he said importantly, "After many long hours of trying to force these fellows away from the disastrous wedding plans they had thought up, I managed to force them into one of those compromise things that everyone says are so great. So, we have decided that the basic outline for the wedding is going to be a black, orange, pink and purple color scheme, the food is barbecue because everyone likes it and it's easy, and the music will be Led Zeppelin…and the Maid of Honor will NOT BE CELINA ADRIENNE! " He seemed to be finished, then added under his breath "so instead we're going to put Moony in a dress whether he likes it or not."

Oh, yeah. Compromise. She would love it.

The Marauders held their breath, waiting for Aurora's reaction.

Somehow, it was not entirely what they –particularly Sirius- had expected.

"AAAIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" She shrieked, her hazel eyes wide, head in her hands, backing away from them like they had some sort of terrible tastelessness disease.

The men only looked at each other nervously and hastily backed up, trying to get out of the line of fire should she decide to start acting unpredictably.

On second thought, though, she already had.

"Not what I wanted, not what I wanted," she was muttering to herself, dramatically clapping a hand to her forehead. "Ohhh, God, I might as well just start from the ground up with nothing, instead of THIS CRAP YOU'VE GIVEN ME TO WORK WITH!" She exploded, glaring at Sirius as though the whole thing was somehow entirely his fault.

Peter, James and Remus scooted a little farther away from the sinner in their midst…it had been _his_ big idea to tell her everything, and now he would have to suffer the consequences.

"Moony," James said hoarsely, "Where did you _find_ this woman?"

Silence.

Then,

"She's a friend of Creidwy's," Remus said sheepishly.

"Well, no wonder she's like this!" Peter managed to get out, looking more and more terrified by the wedding planner as she paced back and forth muttering frantically about trying to create a whole wedding from the ground up for people who didn't know what they wanted. "She's in cahoots with The Crazy Girlfriend! They're all alike!"

"You know Creidwy Caliban?" Sirius asked, trepidation evident in his voice.

"Wha-? Oh, yes!" Aurora exclaimed brightly. "We were in the same N.E.W.T. level Potions class, but I was in Ravenclaw and she was in Slytherin. I somehow managed to explode the Wolfsbane potion she had been working on, and she hexed me so fast I didn't know what had hit me! We've been fast friends ever since," she concluded, as if her touching little "how-we-met" story had made any sense at all to the four poor men who were assembled in front of her, looking bewildered.

"This wedding is getting more and more like Hell," James groaned. "The Crazy Girlfriend is the wedding singer and is not only a nutjob, but also completely mad and more than a little psychotic, the wedding planner wants to skin us alive and is in cahoots with The Crazy Girlfriend, my best man will be on the bridesmaids faster than Gilderoy Lockhart on matching accessories, the 'Maid of Honor' will have to be a MAN IN DRAG if I want the best man to stick around –"

" –HE WILL NOT!" Remus interjected angrily. "There is no way I'm wearing a pink and orange and purple and black DRESS to your wedding! NO WAY!"

"AND NOW WE CAN'T EVEN USE OUR ORIGINAL PLAN!" James howled dramatically. He stood there for a moment as if trying to get a grip, then rounded on Aurora.

"Please, Miss Venus! You have to make this easier on us! It's your job, we're paying you to do it! You plan weddings!" He burst out.

Aurora nodded very seriously, as if humoring this poor young man who was hysterically explaining the details of her job to her as his stunned friends looked on. She smothered a laugh.

"Gentlemen," she began, once James had finally shut up for good. "I suggest that first we talk to the bride. This is _her_ day, after all," she said somewhat sternly.

The four friends looked at one another and nodded miserably. Yes, it was Lily's day. That was how they had gotten into this whole planning mess in the first place.


End file.
